Hepatitis C tests urged for all baby boomers

The Philadelphia Inquirer / The Washington Post ^ | May 19, 2012 | David Brown

[2ndDivisionVet]

The federal government Friday called for all baby boomers to be tested for hepatitis C, which kills more Americans each year than AIDS and is the leading reason for liver transplants.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention made the recommendation to find hundreds of thousands of people who don't realize that they have the infection, which greatly increases their chances of developing cirrhosis and liver cancer.

The hepatitis C virus is transmitted by blood, usually through intravenous drug use or transfusions. A blood test for it became widely available in 1992. Extremely small amounts of the virus are able to cause infection. Some experts believe that rolled-up dollar bills used to snort cocaine and passed person to person can carry enough infected blood to transmit the virus.

"Many baby boomers may not even remember the behaviors that put them at risk," said John Ward, head of the CDC's viral hepatitis division....

[Lady Lucky]

The federal government Friday called for all baby boomers to be tested

Don't go. It's a cookbook!

[Sudetenland]

Great Twilight Zone reference, but seriously, what if they were injecting everyone who came in with an Obama mandated tracker?

If they can get everyone programmed to leap at each pronouncement of some possible pandemic, then all they need is to design the right implant, tell everyone they need to be injected, and BAM! Instant population monitoring.

Is that tin-foil enough??? :)

[LibsRJerks]

And soooo ...what will they do about it once they find out you have it — mock you and tell you that you WON’T be receiving a new liver because they gave out all the extras to illegal aliens and elderly immigrants from a zillion other nations camping out in our hospitals?

It’ll be good, though, as they will have gleaned some great statistics from it.

[Carriage Hill]

LOLOLOL! Best laugh of my week! I should have tried that, but I’d probably have gotten slapped silly! I just can’t keep a straight face.

[Marie Antoinette]

He’s talking about contracting merely by handling bills that somebody else may have used in the fashion stated.

I would like to think not, but who knows.

[Lady Lucky]

My tin foil hat is a lot more simplistic. They’re targeting boomers because boomers are aging and fast becoming the expensive, useless eaters. If they don’t have hep, maybe they’ll get a nice vaccine, some free “vitamins”...or just a complimentary, door-prize dollar bill (laced with hep virus).

[bigtoona]

Maybe this is more for gathering information. I went to a walk in clinic the other day for an antibiotic and they asked me as part of the standard new patient questionnaire ‘Are there any guns in your house?’ This happened in NC. When I asked the nurse why that question is asked, she said its an Obama rule that came out about a year ago..

[Chode]

i got it from poorly cleaned tattoo needles...

[khelus]

...what if they were injecting everyone who came in with an Obama mandated tracker? ...

Or perhaps there is a need to beta test a new three-drug strategy on an "expendable" population while enriching global pharma.

from the article: " The strategy could identify 800,000 new cases in baby boomers ..." "Treatment of hepatitis C infection takes at least six months and consists of pills and a weekly injection. The cure rate used to be less than 30 percent; with a new three-drug strategy, it can be as high as 75 percent."

[riri]

I have a friend who was an esthetician, she transmitted it probably through work. She worked at a salon and they were not allowed to wear gloves while giving facials, waxings, etc. She said sometimes it would get pretty bloody waxing, popping pimples, etc.

[GrandJediMasterYoda]

B-But it’s true it’s true I tell you! Like that time Salma Hayek kidnapped me and made me her sex slave for 3 short years. Sex 50 to 100 even 200 times a day! Oh the humanity! It wouldn’t have been that bad but her friend Megan Fox kept fighting over me that sometimes I would be forced to have sex with them both at the same time!

[Third Person]

Just another government-sponsored medical scare.

[Third Person]

Just another government-sponsored medical scare.

[Third Person]

AARGH... double post.

[Vaduz]

The hepatitis C virus is transmitted by blood and unprotected sex is one way of getting it.
Remember the free love thingy of the sixties?
Maybe Woodstock era wasn’t a good thing after all.

Hippie lights joint and tries to remember.

[riri]

I have read quite a few vets came back from Viet Nam to find out they had transmitted it. That’s very unfortunate.

[FrdmLvr]

worried?

I think their point is that the general public, not just those sharing the dollar bill to snort cocaine, could contract hepatitis C virus if they handled that dollar bill, if that's the criteria HHS is using. Another half-baked government idea.

[Northern Yankee]

The federal government Friday called for all baby boomers to be tested

Like anyone's gonna really care what the federal government recommends at this point.

Good grief... pour me another gin and tonic.

Cheers~

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks 2ndDivisionVet.

[susannah59]

Anyone who ever did IV drugs or got tattoos from “informal” tattoo artists probably would do well to be tested. I had a relative who passed away a couple of years ago from liver failure due to Hepatitis C. He had been a drug user since we were teenagers. He was in his mid-50’s when he died. By the time he got around to going to the doctor it was way too late.